How prisons help resolve housing issues for prisoners using the example of Dorchester Prison

Karen Seal has been the only housing manger for Dorchester Prison, a category B prison, for five years where she has been helping prisoners to find new homes.

The Prison Reform Trust charity organisation state that surveys indicate 30% of people released from prison will have nowhere to live. Every year Karen is approached by around 436 prisoners needing a place to stay. Karen has a target arrange to get at least 80% of them into settled accommodation for their release which means somewhere they can stay for at least 2 months.

She chooses to do this demanding work as she deeply empathises with the prisoners. She said:

“You and me, we’ve had opportunities, they haven’t got the capabilities of holding down a job, and many of them have mental health and family problems.

“You can’t condemn someone for the rest of their life for one mistake at the end of the day they are still human beings.”

Dorchester Prison is a category B prison, out of the A-D categories. Prisons in the UK rank from A to D from most to least secure.

Karen receives many prisoners directly from courts who then usually move onto a category C prison. The prisoners she works with are serving short sentences of under a year. The prisoners serving more than a year are offered help with housing with the probation services or if they are very high risk they go to bail houses.

 

The help prisoners receive within prison

The first thing the prison Karen does is to organise an initial housing assessment with each prisoner where they are asked if they have any property. If the answer is yes then she works with them with housing benefits where each prisoner is given a housing benefit change of circumstance form.

Prisoners on remand can get housing benefit for up to a year. If they are sentenced as long as they return within 13 weeks their tenancy can be kept through housing benefit. She said:

“A week before a prisoner leaves we get each prisoner to go to a discharge board. We make sure each prisoner has a date to sign on for benefits so that he can go back to where he came from and everything’s sorted out.

“We do our best to help prisoners so they’re not just shown the door. It’s changed from many years ago when that was more the case.”

 

The issue of illegal evictions

 

Many people find themselves kicked out with nowhere to live after prison

 

Many prisoners who had private accommodation before their arrest face illegal evictions through landlords. Shelter, a national charity that helps with private accommodation, works with several prisons throughout the UK such as HMP Dorchester with this issue. A new service this year called the Prisoners Advocacy Release Team (PART) helps newly released prisoners find settled homes and avoid re-offending. PART offers legal help for prisoners faced with complicated illegal evictions. Karen said:

“Many landlords change the locks and get rid of people’s stuff which they can’t do because there is a tenancy agreement that both people have to abide by.

“Shelter have got access to solicitors in tenancy law so they can work with HMP Dorchester in representing people in court. They’ve helped with around 60 cases over the last two years in this prison.”

Karen also helps prisoners find a place to stay mainly in supported accommodation as many prisoners don’t have the finances for private accommodation. She said:

“Things are changing recently as we have been working closely with Bournemouth Council in finding prisoners accommodation through the private rented sector and things have changed a lot for the better.”

On the education support side of things, HMP Dorchester also has an Information and Guidance department and which arrange for any courses and education prisoners want to do when they leave to increase their chances of future employment.